Forest Froghoppers!

Posted on June 25, 2016

The Little Foresters enjoyed another adventure yesterday, dry and sunny, it was the perfect day for mini-beast hunting! Building on the children’s interests form our visit to Foxglove Covert I offered them the same bug collecting kit with the addition of little books of identification cards. First, we searched under fallen branches and log piles, pushing and rolling them to have a look. The children were surprised how many centipedes and woodlice they discovered and it wasn’t long before we had collected a variety of insects and bugs. Amongst these there were worms, spiders, and even a little frog. In recent sessions the children have decided on a favourite mini-beast, though I am not sure I share their view) - slugs, the bigger, the slimier, the better! 

Today was about sharing our learning with those children not in nursery on Wednesday, and seeing something ‘spit’ like amongst the grass I encouraged the children to talk about this “it’s got a bug inside”. Carefully taking the Cuckoo Spit we looked inside and discovered the small creature that lived there, that would grow up to become a froghopper. It was fascinating to think about how something so small could make this frothy coating. June is the perfect time to see this and it wasn’t long before spot the Cuckoo Spit became the game of the day.

Having looked down low we had just enough time to look at what lived up high, one child thought there “maybe a caterpillar” but as we shook the tree it was the green spiders that fell out which fascinated the children. Despite the colour of our Incy Wincy logo it seems the children still thought all spiders should be black!

Our afternoon session was a little longer this week as the children stayed to eat their tea out in the woods.  It was the perfect time to come together to talk about what we had discovered, we even created with our own Little Foresters song. Perhaps if you are down in the woods next week, you may hear us singing.

Leanne & the Little Foresters